There are about 200 breeds of pigs worldwide. Among them, European breeds account for about 33% and Asian breeds account for about 30%. These pig breeds can be easily distinguished based on phenotypic differences such as hair color, size, body shape, etc. However, in the case of lean meat, color, water-holding capacity, shearing force, etc., they vary with time and thus it is difficult even for specialists as well as ordinary people to distinguish pig breeds by the naked eye based on the meat of pigs. Recently, many efforts have been made to improve the quality of pig meat. Pigs are now being bred in Korea under certain standards or management using a scientific system, and Korean native pigs obtained as such are branded, and various brands of pig meat are already commercially available.
As part of this study, active studies are being conducted in the direction of discovering and developing methods to identify the breeds of pork meat using various DNA analysis methods. For example, Korean Patent Application Publication No. 10-2004-0039059 discloses a genetic detection method for selecting pigs with excellent phenotypic traits using specific DNA markers related to average daily gain, backfat thickness, and meat quality of pigs, and Korean Patent Application Publication No. 10-2007-0113336 discloses a DNA marker for detecting the increase in the number of pig muscle cells using single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) by the difference in a single nucleotide sequence in the 5′ promoter region of myogenin gene, which is known to be involved in myogenesis of pigs. However, the method for accurately determining the level of meat quality traits of pigs has not yet been developed, and additionally, the method for determining the level of meat quality of pigs using MYH3 gene has not been developed.
Under these circumstances, the present inventors have made efforts to develop a method for determining the quality of pork meat through genetic traits. As a result, they have confirmed that MYH3 gene is a gene capable of determining the meat quality of pigs and that it is possible to easily determine the meat quality of pigs determined genetically using the same, thereby completing the present invention.